chelo: Thanks for reading and commenting.
Oh, you and Female Hawk made my friday!!
Maybe if I can get my new part to work better / puts 3 pages written last night into deleted scene folder / I'll post late Wednesday night. It seems like the weekend is become more and more crowded with stories posting.
Poor padre Carlos!! Without powers he became an easy Target... I hope Clark find a way to help him...
About Lex.... hhhhgggg!! I can't believe he discover Superman's reflect in the window AND Superman didn't hear Lois's words!!
I can't make this investigation too easy for Lois, can I? We don't know yet what Superman did or did not hear, but it was enough to send him down to Brazil to seek Carlos's counsel.
About Lois's suggestion about have a runner between Lois and Clark.:... could that be Jack??
![[Linked Image]](http://cosgan.de/images/smilie/frech/e015.gif)
I can not wait until it is Friday again!!!
Thanks.
mrsMxyzptlk: Thanks for not giving up on my lunkheaded characters.
Clark must have a guardian angel in the city's park maintenance department. That guy with the lawnmower has impeccable timing.
Yeah, I was wondering if that was too coincidental, especially for a Saturday.
HG WELLS: /wipes brows/ These new-fangled grass cutting machines are difficult to operate. I'm going to stick to time-machines.
I really enjoyed this chapter. I didn't spend it banging my head on my desk over Lois's bad decisions. [happy about that] She came off much more level-headed than she has tended to lately.
Always good to hear.
I found it odd that Clark assumed that Carlos had had an accident. I assumed that he was sick. I don't remember there being any indication of whether he was sick or injured before Clark talked to the other guy about it.
Clark knew that Carlos was in good physical condition some six weeks earlier, so that he wouldn't automatically think of a sickness that would end Carlos up in intensive care. He figured that Carlos was hurt during his vigilante work as the Jaguar but that he would call the injury an "accident" to keep his secret identity in tact, which is why Clark called it an accident. He didn't think it was an 'accident' at all.
I wonder what Carlos thinks of Clark. He knows Clark's story, right?
Yes.
So here he is, a Catholic priest, asked to swallow that he's the reincarnation of an alien whose alternate-dimension counterpart has come to visit. I'm not an expert on Catholicism, but I'd guess that reincarnation, if not aliens and other dimensions, falls afoul of their doctrine. (I guess he can't really escape the reality of aliens, though.)
I believe reincarnation goes against the doctrine of "heaven / hell" yes. Does he believe that Clark is from another dimension? Well, he didn't really believe in aliens until SM arrived so maybe it's possible that there are other dimensions and time-travel; although, he doesn't like the idea of tampering with what God had written.
Maybe Carlos sees someone in need of spiritual help and is just humoring him as far as their connection goes, or maybe Carlos believes Clark and has reconciled that with his faith. Either way, it probably doesn't have any bearing on the story.
There are some things that Carlos can't refute. A) He knows that CK=SM, and that SM is from another planet. B) that CK/SM looks like himself (that was one of the reasons he grew a beard after SM arrived on the scene, as a sort of secret identity / his "glasses" so to speak.) Does Carlos believe Clark about him being the reincarnation of baby Kal-El of this dimension? Not so much. He believes that Clark believes it. He's open minded enough to know that other religions' beliefs and his own don't always mesh. It doesn't make them wrong, only different. He's honored that SM comes to him for counsel, despite their different religious beliefs, and hopes he might be able to assist him on his journey. Maybe this was why God made him and SM so similar, in looks and interests, so that SM would be open to hearing Carlos's counsel. Does Carlos believe that Lois is his true soul mate? No, which -- besides the obvious reason, of him being a priest -- is why he openly and freely tells Clark not to change the past (well, that, and because he doesn't like the idea of man changing God's will). He doesn't want to believe that Clark can actually change the past, but he's not taking any chances. Being that Carlos goes against the Church to be the Jaguar, I have tried to write him more open to new ideas, but also having a keen sense of history (the Church having once believed in witches and curses and such) and values. His sense of right and wrong may differ from Clark's due to how he was raised.
I just find it interesting to have fictional characters reconcile their religious faith with whatever crazy science fiction is thrown at them. As a religious person myself, I'm amused to find that I can easily suspend my disbelief on things like aliens with superpowers and alternate dimensions, but the ideas of reincarnation and soul mates rub me the wrong way so much that I tend to dismiss them and can't suspend my disbelief. Reincarnation is no less fantastical to me than flying and heat vision, yet I can suspend my disbelief on one but not the other. I find myself putting myself in Carlos's place - what if someone came to me with the claims that Clark makes? I probably wouldn't believe them, but Carlos has found some way to not believe that Clark is nuts.
I grew up Catholic (at least through second grade) and I found that the range of people I met at the varying Catholic schools I attended went from open minded to closed minded, which I think really depends on how much control someone is trying to exert over their own life. I personally like the idea of reincarnation (I actually liked Soul Mates because of the time-travel / other lives aspect), whether or not it exists, though, falls in the realm of flying superheroes and aliens. It's not something I'm ever going to find an answer to during this lifetime. I like to think of other dimensions / parallel universes in the way the Gweneth Paltrow movie
Sliding Doors explores, how our choices impact our lives and change the path we take. I was recently thinking how different my life might be if we had purchased another house (one with TWO bathrooms instead of one) we looked at down the street instead of this one. Would that one change in my past, being that the other house was a bit more expensive, led to me to return to work earlier? My children would have different friends, because they'd be attending a different school. Would I have found this wonderful fandom of LnC or would I have explored other interests? Would it have made our life better or worse or kept it the same? Truthfully, the only reason I write (long) alt-Clark stories is because I find him more flawed than canon Clark and thus, more human and easier to write.
Part of the reason I made Carlos a priest was to try to get into the head of someone who doesn't think exactly as I do. It's also why I'll sometimes write from a completely new POV (Lex, Mrs. Cox, Kirk, Perry, Martha, etc), to try and get inside their head and figure out what motivates them to make the choices they do. I hope I do them justice. Thank goodness for great Betas to make sure I don't make too big of mistakes.
